


January Promptly Arrives

by Zaniida



Series: Monthly Prompts for 2018 [1]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Challenges, Denise's Delight, FinchWhump (just a little), Gen, I still don't know how these things work, Monthly Challenges, but I challenge y'all anyway!, monthly prompts, prompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 05:35:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13229145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zaniida/pseuds/Zaniida
Summary: I shall offer one story prompt per month (ideally).  I write a challenging situation, and you have the chance to write how it plays out -- and/or how the characters got into the mess in the first place.





	January Promptly Arrives

**Author's Note:**

> I still don't really know how prompts/challenges are supposed to work on this site; I don't even know the appropriate way to use the terminology. While I put off putting time into learning these things, have a prompt/challenge!
> 
> Much like with _[Three Minutes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11827620)_ , I post a short scene, and any of my fellow writers can choose to follow up on it -- to write how the scene plays out, how John and Harold get out of the predicament they're in, how everything works out for the best (or not), and possibly some flashbacks or prequel scenes showing how things got this bad in the first place.
> 
> My challenge for _myself_ is to get a different challenge up each month. In addition, I will attempt to write a follow-up piece to each challenge, based on the number of responses the challenge gets. At present, I think I can manage a page per work I inspire. Hence, if this challenge nets 5 responses by the end of the month, I shall try to write a five-page follow-up myself, and see where that takes me. (I reserve the right to make it one page _per author who submits a response_ , although I fully encourage anyone who cares to write multiple pieces to create them anyway. If it's not too much of an overload, I might rise to the challenge.)
> 
> In this particular piece, I left the identity of the enemy up in the air. Use an existing villain or create your own, as you desire. (You can also swap genders if you like. I could see a particularly dark Kara doing this kind of thing.)

“Put the gun down, John,” the man says calmly. “It won’t do you any good, anyway. Unless you want your partner here” -- and Harold drops a few inches before being yanked to a stop, his gasp anxious yet groggy -- “to reacquaint himself with gravity.”

Glaring up at the balcony, John carefully lowers his gun to the floor, and kicks it away as soon as he gets back to full height. He doesn’t take his gaze off their enemy, although it’s hard not to stare in horror at Harold’s bruised and bleeding back, at the thick welts that cross the skin.

Suspended in some kind of seated harness, Harold hangs above a two-story drop, his hands tied to the rope about a foot above his head. The back of his suit has been cut off, leaving ragged edges along the sides, including where his sleeves bunch up around his stretched shoulders. The pressure of the harness on his wounds is surely agonizing, yet John knows that the far greater pain for his partner is the vulnerability and humiliation of his bare flesh on display.

Perhaps it’s a mercy that he’s been drugged. At least, that’s John’s first guess: Harold’s head keeps bobbing, slowly relaxing down and then jerking up again, as if fighting off sleep. How else could he be so close to passing out? Has the pain gotten to be too much? Has exhaustion taken over, from hours spent fighting back fear and uncertainty, trying to cling to the hope that John will get there in time?

 _It will all be over soon_ , he promises, silently, continuing to keep an eye on his partner with just his peripheral vision.

He keeps his gaze centered on their enemy, whose mouth twists up into a cocksure grin. “Now,” the man says, “since I don’t for a moment trust that I just disarmed you, you can leave your clothes behind as well. Take ’em _all_ off. Unless your dignity is worth his life?”

**Author's Note:**

> While editing for publication here, I realized that nothing in the final fic describes this being indoors. I envisioned it indoors -- in the Library, specifically, although I couldn't find a good pic of the stairwell, so I'm mostly extrapolating from the pilot that there's a two-story interior drop there, which John can look at from a position one story below.
> 
> But feel free to change the venue! Nothing says it has to be the way that the scene showed up in my head.
> 
> * * * * *
> 
> My attempt at creating actual site-mechanics-type challenges didn't attract anyone who actually knew how to use the site mechanics in that way, so they're still sitting here, all lonely: http://archiveofourown.org/users/Zaniida/collections
> 
> Feel free to follow up on any of them! It's a brand new year, and time for creativity to spring forth anew =^.^=

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Catch](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13351779) by [elbowsinsidethedoor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elbowsinsidethedoor/pseuds/elbowsinsidethedoor)




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